Lady for the King
Lady for the King began in the Denver airport on a trip to my grandmother’s home in Kansas in 2008. I recall that I was sitting at a little metal table outside a cafe, waiting for my mother to pick up some salads, and began doodling in a notebook of mine. I had been thinking about the concept of crossdressing as used in stories I was familiar with—such as Viola from Twelfth Night—and realized that I’d only ever really read about women dressing up as men, so I wanted to develop a male character who was forced to dress up as a woman. I scribbled down some pictures of Reuben and then quickly wove a little story around him as to why he had to do this. There’s quite a bit more to LftK (Lady for the King) than stories like Gunpowder Princess, at least as far as character development goes. LftK is set on a continent called Eralen. Most places outside the city of Kyrria (where Reuben’s family rules) don’t have much of a role in the story at this point, but they are there nonetheless. Kyrria itself is rather like Paris, a center of fashion and nobility, but it is divided between aristocracy and peasantry, the latter of which often live in poverty unless they run a successful business (visited by the aristocracy). I’ve considered the idea of a civil war somewhere in LftK because of this schism. Kyrria is set on a slight hill, going downwards towards the east. The palace faces south. When the city was built, open waterways were cut so that everything would drain into a large canal on the far east end of the city, but they have since been covered up to make the city more slightly. However, small bridges still exist everywhere in the city. People in Kyrria often have dark hair and are rather pale due to the lack of sunlight in the city (many tall and illustrious buildings in a confined area). Other realms in Eralen include Lidegar (capital Teren), a Scandinavian sort of area where the people rely on traded goods and game hunting for their wellbeing. The climate is very often overcast and the people maintain Kyrria’s dark hair and pale skin, though they tend to be of a less slender build. The royal family is a class of warriors. Finally, Bar-Raqel (capital Asaal) is to the south of Kyrria. The land is mostly barren except for cities along the large giver. Asaal is set on a man-made island in the largest part of the river. People from this area tend to be have dark skin, light hair, and a hardy build. Now, on to the actual story… Kyrria’s line of succession goes thus: The youngest male in the royal family over the age of 19 becomes king when the previous king dies. The royal family constitutes the children of the current king, his brothers (including those married into the family), and his brother’s sons. This way makes for more variety, often, in the royal line, but is also quite prone to corruption, as we see in LftK. The royal family at the very beginning of LftK is thus: Asteron Selar Allurian has just died. His son, Reuben Selar Allurian, is nineteen years old, and has been crowned king only the day after. Reuben is very much not ready for the position; he spent much of his life holed up in his room with anxiety problems, painting and talking to his cousin, Resk Ketari Allurian. Resk is twenty-two years old, half Asaalian from his father’s side, and would have made the perfect king, had Asteron died only a year earlier. Finally, Asteron’s oldest brother, Orellon Selar Allurian, has two children. Rinn is eighteen years old and his sister, Elaria, is twenty one years old. Orellon has been trying to get Elaria betrothed to Resk for a long time. Elaria does actually love Resk quite a lot. The beginning of the story finds Reuben at his coronation dinner with some select guests from other countries. However, when one of the women criticizes his choice of hairstyle (too long for his city’s fashion, “even for men”), he has an anxiety attack and leaves. Resk does his best to wrap everything up neatly and goes after him. When Reuben gets to his room and finds a maid there cleaning, he fires her in his frustration and then just kind of has a breakdown. Resk comes to comfort him until he falls asleep, and as he leaves Orellon solicits him about Elaria again. When Reuben wakes up, he finds himself in Kyrrian slums—a terrifying situation for him, as he has never set foot outside the palace and its grounds. Shortly thereafter he comes upon a flier (one of many dropped throughout the city) written by the chamberlain. It explains that King Asteron was found to be poisoned and that Reuben has fled the palace—they announce that he was the murderer, greedy for the throne, and that Resk will be crowned that evening. Reuben is wanted alive. Reuben is in a full-blown panic now; he knows that the people of the city have no idea what he is like other than his infamously long brown hair, so he goes to the east canal and chops most of it off, saving the golden beads from it to buy food for himself. He realizes as he does this, however, that everyone thinks he is a girl because of his short hair and slender figure. Everything here is a little vague but I believe that he happens to come across the family of the girl he fired when he goes to buy food… I don’t know if it’s his own idea to try to get into the palace as a maid after that, or if Simi helps him. I don’t have a solid way that he gets to Simi, but he does eventually, and she in her wisdom knows immediately what and who he is. However, she decides to help him. Simi is an old woman with a female cat which used to be named Leroy, but I will probably change that name to suit the setting more (probably need to change Reuben’s name as well). Simi, a tailor and cosmetician by trade, creates clothes and prosthetic clay for Reuben (he has to have the clay because the current Kyrrian fashion involves sleeveless dresses, and it would be difficult to make Reuben look womanly in that style without some additional bust… This part is also vague; Reuben gets into the palace. He introduced himself as “Ruby” before this because he was dumb but I think Simi might devise a better name for him. His actual position keeps changing; right now he is a designer/seamstress because he already possessed the drawing skills and Simi could have taught him a little sewing. It also provides a good opportunity for him to come across Orellon. Reuben ends up rooming with a lively girl named Adi, whom he quickly develops a frustrating affection for—frustrating both because of his current situation and also because her taste in men absolutely does not match him, so combined with his anxiety he feels he would have no chance with her even if he was “himself”. Most everything past here is also very vague. I know that Reuben at some point finds out about Orellon’s schemes and realizes that he has to get close to Resk to tell him about it (Orellon wants to kill Resk off as well once Rinn is of age and then rule through his son). At one point I had him trying to do this through means of seduction (I had always wanted Resk to fall in love with “Ruby” at some point anyway because it would provide both comedy and intrigue because a lot of eyes would be on Reuben if anyone found out Resk was in love with a maid). I also had the idea that everyone in the royal family has a certain tattoo on their lower stomachs, which only the royal family is aware of. Reuben wouldn’t be able to use his to get back to his position as king, since everyone in the palace thinks he is a murderer. However, he notices when taking Orellon’s measurements that Orellon doesn’t actually have the mark. This is just an option, and I’m not sure what it would imply. I think that in the end I would like for Reuben to become Ambassador for the People instead of King, because he sees like no one in the royal family has the squalor of the city. Also, this would mean that he would need to learn to cope with his anxiety throughout the story, and I would like to have that as an outcome. At one point I had Reuben start a sort of secret society with Adi in support of Reuben, though Adi didn’t know that “Ruby” was actually Reuben. I don’t know what sort of use that would be. In the very first version of the story, I also had Reuben’s secret come out when he tries to defend Adi from a drunk man at a banquet (at that point Reuben was a food server like Adi). I don’t know what happens with Adi; at one point I thought that Elaria’s servant, Ilse, might walk in on Reuben talking in his sleep and find out that he is a man (though not necessarily who he is). That would definitely mean trouble for Reuben, especially if Elaria found out. In an original draft this was a turning point for Reuben because he had to be very aggressive with Ilse in order to keep her from telling anybody. I don’t know if I like that though? I almost like the idea of Reuben’s seduction of Resk as a turning point for him, though I don’t really know. I wonder what it would feel like to a man to feel that sort of empowerment. I also don’t know how other people would take that, so who knows. I also don’t know what happens when Reuben finally gets to Resk! I don’t want Resk to be the one who fixes everything. Blah. This story has gone through a couple writing styles; at one point I tried to write it in a style rather like The Scarlet Pimpernel because I felt it matched the sort of French Revolution flavor, but I don’t know if I could keep that up, especially with the subject matter and humor I want involved. Reuben’s predicament hasn’t changed much since his beginnings; at the beginning of the story he has just been crowned King after his father’s death. Soon after, he is kidnapped by his uncle and thrown out on the streets, where he has to fend for himself and soon learns that he has been deemed a traitor; in order to keep anyone from recognizing him, he has to cut his lavishly long hair. He then finds himself in the company of Gramma Simi, who helps him to get back into the palace by dressing him up as a lady-in-waiting. While there, Reuben catches the attention of his cousin Resk, and chaos ensues. Reuben’s personality, however has changed a lot over the years. In the beginning, I based his personality off of a picture I had drawn a month or two before of a man dressed in lavish clothing reclining on a bed and looking out a window over a golden city. Originally Reuben was a spoiled brat—he still rather is, but he’s nowhere near as selfish and presumptuous as his past self. As time went by I developed the town more, influenced by the French Revolution and musicals like The Scarlet Pimpernel, into a place divided between intense poverty and rich bourgeoisie. I decided that I wanted the message of the story to be about Reuben’s “coming of age” and also his realizations about the treatment of the poor and women. In Kyrria (Reuben’s city and kingdom), the royal family never steps foot outside of the palace grounds, and so Reuben was not even aware of the state of the city until he was in the thick of it. The newer version leaves off around there, but the older one continues for some time longer. It’s been mentioned in the text, but now would probably be a good time to clarify Kyrria’s order of succession. The youngest male in the royal family over the age of 19 becomes king when the previous king dies. The royal family constitutes the children of the current king, his brothers (including those married into the family), and his brother’s sons. This way makes for more variety, often, in the royal line, but is also quite prone to corruption, as we see in LftK. Also, the current royal family consists of the following people: Resk is Reuben’s cousin through his father’s older brother. Resk is twenty-two years old, and would have made the perfect king, had Reuben’s father Asteron died only a year earlier. Finally, Asteron’s oldest brother, Orellon Allurian, has two children. Rinn is eighteen years old and his sister, Elaria, is twenty one years old. Orellon has been trying to get Elaria betrothed to Resk for a long time. Elaria does actually love Resk quite a lot. Currently Orellon is trying to clear the way for Rinn to become king. Obviously, he’s not really doing this for Rinn’s sake; he could essentially rule Kyrria through his son. ' ' I’ve never really been sure how best to execute Reuben getting into the castle itself, and so most linear writings of the story end at this point. I have a handful of scenes from later in the story that I wrote in 2009 or 2010. In most versions, Reuben ends up working as a seamstress because he is actually quite a good painter—he learned during all of his time alone growing up—so he can design things as well as sew a little from what he learned from Simi. He ends up rooming with Adi, a girl who works in the kitchens and serves food to the royals, the sister of the girl that Reuben fired early in the story. In early versions, I had him fall in love with Adi, but in more recent versions that hasn’t really fit into the plot with everything else Reuben has to deal with. Ilse is another minor character in the story. I don’t really know what her role is in more recent versions, but before she was the first to discover that “Ruby” is a man. She’s also a lady-in-waiting to Elaria, which complicates matters quite a bit. LftK was kind of like a soap opera for a while. In late 2010 I even wrote a little romance between Reuben and Resk and I can’t find any of the text for that, either. I recall that there was a sort of ball and Resk was expected to choose a wife and the atmosphere was really kind of sleazy. In that version Reuben and Adi had formed a sort of secret society to inform the royalty that Reuben was still alive (though Adi wasn’t aware that Ruby was actually Reuben) and so Reuben was supposed to seduce Resk so that he could get close to him and tell him about this secret society and Orellon’s plans. Adi helped him dress up in something really nice and the ball was one of the first times that Reuben really broke down at his treatment from men based on how he looked. In other versions Reuben has been assaulted and harassed by Orellon and other aristocrats as a servant—something he didn’t even realize happened. At one point I had the idea that Orellon was maybe not actually part of the royal family—probably an imposter instead—and Reuben recognizes this as Orellon is getting fitted for a garment, since royal family members are supposed to have a raven crest tattooed on their hips and Orellon doesn’t (this isn’t something servants know about so nobody else would have understood). But I didn’t really know what to do with this plot so it never went anywhere. I’ve developed some of Kyrria’s world and tried to add more politics and intrigue to the story but haven’t truly worked on it all for a few years. WORLD - ERALEN COUNTRIES Kyrria (capital Kyrria) Kyrria is rather the equivalent of Paris. It is divided between the aristocracy and commoners, most of whom live in extreme poverty unless they run a business which is frequented by workers for the royal family or aristocrats. At the beginning of LftK, the city is on the brink of a civil war, and these businesses are also under risk because of the hatred of the common people. From above, the city appears to be a bright and thriving place, with tall buildings and over all the expensive and beautiful palace. However, on the inside the streets of the city are full of squalor, with the possible exception of the main roads traveled by the richer class and lined with the larger or more popular businesses. The people of Kyrria are often pale and have darker hair because of the relatively cold climate and lack of sunshine in the city. Kyrria itself has never been under siege, being a self-absorbed city and drawing resources from many of the surrounding areas. Lidegar (capital Teren) Lidegar is a country to the north of Kyrria, colder and icier. It’s much like Scandinavia. The people there all wear their hair long (which is considered a taboo in Kyrria). The people of Lidegar are hard workers and live mostly on imported goods and the food that their hunters garner. Lidegar people maintain the dark-haired and pale complexion of the Kyrrians because of the climate, which is often overcast, but tend not to be as thin or well-kept. The country itself is much larger than Kyrria, with large mountains and tundra plants. The government is not as tight or strict as in Kyrria, so the people tend to be healthier but are still not terribly friendly. The royal family is a class of warriors (or those who were once warriors) and are fairly jovial in personality. Lidegar was once a fairly isolated country and still mostly stays out of trouble, but otherwise has good enough relations with other countries. Bar-Raqel (capital Asaal) Bar-Raqel is far to the southeast and not really in LftK. The country is mostly barren except for cities along the river, around which are many lush jungles. ' ' After I did this world building I decided that Resk is perhaps not related to Reuben by blood, which would add intrigue to his reign (and also leave open the option for a romance plot which I don’t think I will do anything with. I like to think that if I ever publish this then the fans can write fics about it)). His mother was born and married in Asaal, but her husband died and so she married into Kyrria’s royal family to seal an alliance between Bar-Raqel and Kyrria. She never had any children with Resk’s father though, and cherished her son though her new marriage was never very happy. Though I don’t really have the lot of LftK finished, for a few years now I have wanted it to end with Resk remaining king and Reuben becoming a sort of ambassador for the people. He slowly gains more confidence after the whole ordeal and becomes well beloved of the lower class and strives to create a more equal society in Kyrria.